Catch Up

It's been a week plus since an update!  We had a blizzard over the weekend with Lots of Snow and Lots of Shoveling to go along with it.  Ein's obedience match was cancelled this past Saturday which is very sad!

We did get to our ring rental last Thursday to practice Obedience things.   Stand for Exam continues to be solid and I am feeling very positive about Ein's ring-readiness in Novice Obedience.  I entered and got his entry confirmation for a late March trial and I just sat there and stared at the email for a little while.  Too good to be true?   AKC Obedience has been an out of reach dream for me...until now.

We also practiced adding distance to his dumbbell retrieve, which presented a new issue: mouthing.  He was panting and this caused some mouthing so we will have to work on that!  We also continued to work on adding spatial pressure form a "judge" when he has to do a retrieve and that was hard for Ein.   I threw his DB and sent him but he had to go sniff my friend first before doing his retrieve, or he would retrieve the DB and then sniff her and then come to front.  I quickly switched to treat throws and he was happy to ignore her to run out and "retrieve" the treats, so I think we will continue to practice that a lot more before mixing the DB in.  Next time I find a helper to work on this we will do the treat throws first before the DB and then alternate.

Speaking of Ein, I ordered him a fancy-pants new collar for his Christmas/best dog ever/trialing purposes from Ella's Lead.  It's their "Space Dog" collar and I just love it on him.  He has never had a collar this wide (1.25"!) but I just love how it shows up in his fur.

Here it is from their Facebook page!  It is the black and silver one.

As for the other dog's, Molly had another follow up appointment for her infected anal gland on Monday.   The left gland expressed clear, of course.  The right gland expressed...improved!  Finally!  There was still blood in the discharge but it was trace amounts of blood in normal gland fluid.  Up until now, the discharge has been pure dark blood.  I feel very happy!  It is about time that poor Molly gets some relief.

This week has also included a chiropractor visit for both girls.  Molly once again got an overall clean bill of health, with some misalignments in her cervical.  This makes sense because Molly got a new long rope toy for Christmas and her and Vince have been tugging fools ever since!  Dr G adjusted Molly and said that we will take a week's break from rope toy tug!

Perri also had an adjustment, and Dr G called attention to something I thought I had been imagining... Perri is roaching her back.  She asked if Perri's belly has been upset lately, but also said that the thoracolumbar area itself is tender so that is most likely the cause.   She lasered Perri, recommended heat and to keep an eye on it.  I wonder if Perri is sore from her recent off leash hike as well as the snowy weather.  I have not allowed her to play in the snow...so I'm not sure why she is sore in her lower back.  Sigh.  Going to focus on the heat and some paws up/stretching exercises and see where that gets us.

We are also enrolled in the FDSA class "Structure and Movement" so I am eager to learn some things about compensating for Perri's straight front end in that class!

So, that is about it for me and the pups.   Molly has her first agility trial in over a month this Saturday - just two Standard runs in CPE.   Looking forwards to that, I took enough time off of trialing that I miss it dearly! (only a month, but I'm an addict!)